The Root of the Problem
Fri, Jun 26, 10am
El Charco del Ingenio
70 pesos members/100 non-members

The Root of the Problem—the soil doctor speaks A talk on soil regeneration in San Miguel and environs By Georgeann Johnson

We know more about the movement of celestial bodies than about the soil underfoot.

- Leonardo da Vinci, circa 1500s 

It’s mid-morning and this early June day is already beginning to heat up. I am meeting with Doug Weatherbee, originally from Nova Scotia, Canada, to talk about his upcoming presentation at El Charco. I’ve met Doug before. A few months back a group met to talk about all manner of things organic: food, gardens, GMOs, farming. Doug described the subterranean world of life beneath our feet. Soil. It was fascinating. Organic growing mixed with science. Doug shared his expertise with ease, passion, and delight—his vivid descriptions brought our local landscapes into a new clarity.

Doug, a sort of local “soil doctor in residence,” speaks about how an understanding of Nature’s soil ecosystem regeneration patterns can help revivify our depleted soil system. “Feed the soil and the soil will feed our plants,” he says, “but we often do the reverse and think we need to fertilize the plants. How does a natural forest feed itself without our fertilizers?” 

As we know by looking at the dusty sparsely vegetated campo that surrounds San Miguel, rapid soil degradation of our municipality and environs is an alarming problem. “Soil can either improve or degrade,” Doug points out. “Whether we farm as big agriculture or small gardens in our backyard, chemical fertilizers, pesticides, fungicides, tilling, burning, all degrade the soil by killing its natural soil microbes.” Rich soils are filled with trillions and trillions of microscopic critters like bacteria, fungi, protozoa and nematodes. Each one of the millions of species has a specific job to do in the soil. In healthy soils, most are helping our plants thrive. “When we kill them,” Doug says, “we inherit their jobs and we’re not very good at it.” It turns out its better to figure out which microscopic critters are missing from the soil and help get them back there, letting them do their natural jobs. “If we all packed and left San Miguel today, Nature can regenerate our soils and plant landscapes, but it might sev
eral hundred years or more. We need to speed this up.” 

The “soil doctor” collects a soil sample and ships it off to a soil microbiology lab in Oregon.(This lab is one of the quickly sprouting Soil Foodweb labs of the world by renowned Soil Microbiologist Dr. Elaine Ingham. The latest just opened in South Africa where Dr. Ingham is assisting large corporate growers to turn their 100,000 hectare plantations into regenerated Soil Foodweb systems.) Within a week the analysis results are back and the doctor begins to apply his remedies. Not a pesticide, not a fertilizer, not a chemical. But a regeneration plan that serves as an ally to speed up Nature's own soil regeneration processes. “I try to bring back specific balances of soil microbes that support growing certain groups of plants. Those who have walked in an old growth forest know there's a difference between that soil and San Miguel's soil. Each soil supports different plants.” Doug mentions the how broccoli grows in the San Miguel area soils but it’s more difficult to grow fruit trees. “The soil microbiology plays a large part in creating these different soils and supporting the health of these different plants.” 

Doug is currently working closely with Dr. Ingham to become a Certified Soil Foodweb Advisor. He has worked with and studied watershed restoration with Craig Stonholtz of Dryland Solutions in Santa Fe, New Mexico, where he learned Bill Zeedyck’s Induced Meandering river restoration techniques. He is a Certified Permaculture Designer and Teacher, having studied with one of the world’s leading Permaculturalists, the brilliant Geoff Lawton, of the Permaculture Research Institute in Australia. (Geoff Lawton led the miracle of turning 10 acres near the Dead Sea in Jordon into a veritable Garden of Eden. Check out “Greening the Desert” on youtube.com). 

Doug Weatherbee's talk is part of the Garden Lecture Series. He is a fascinating speaker, with knowledge of rainwater harvesting through large scale landscape and earthwork design; permaculture food forest ecosystems; river and watershed restoration; and, organic growing through soil microbiology. In this talk, you’ll learn about the mysterious subterranean world of soil, and hopefully walk away with some ideas about transforming your dirt into rich soil. Contact nzerriffi@yahoo.com  for reservations.